The Hawk Creative Business Park was conceived and built as an eco-friendly, sustainable conversion from an 1880’s “model Home Farm” to the then Hawkhills Estate. It was designed to retain the integrity and character of the original layout while at the same time using and integrating the very latest in technology. This included a Building Management System with the installation of the first automatically dimmable low energy strip lighting which ensures consistent light levels as external light levels change together with underfloor heating powered by renewable biomass as its energy source in the UK. These measures ensured that the Energy Performance Certificate gave a very low ‘A’ rating of 16 rarely seen in new build let alone renovations. At the same time, investment in a fibre optic connection for the broadband supply afforded maximum flexibility and offers to tenants for internet connectivity and telephony with virtually immediate connection.
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While carrying out the development of “The Hawk” in 2007, under the watchful and expert eye of the York Archaeological Trust, remnants of a medieval barn were discovered under part of “Golden Eagle” giving further proof of by-gone habitation. When the Easingwold bypass was built some years earlier, ancient wattle roadways were discovered less than a mile from “The Hawk” dating from the time when the area was part of the ancient ‘Forest of Galtres’.

As part of the substantial investment in the Estate by the new owners of the Estate (the Love Family) built a completely new set of farm buildings and the main part of the ‘new’ farm house in the 1880s along a “model farm” basis. The bricks were all made in the Estate’s own brick yard using clay dug from the now heavily wooded area adjacent to the roundabout on the A19. The construction of the new farmhouse was to a very high standard and the property demonstrates one of the earliest examples of a residence with cavity walls with each of the inter wall ties comprising a much more robust piece of metal work than is found today. All roof water was collected from the house and directed into a large underground brick lined tank to the side of the House. The farm buildings were built around a traditional covered fold yard for wintering cattle with stabling for 13 cart horses and grain storage to the rear. All these buildings now form the centre piece of The Hawk Creative Business Park.

The “Hawkhills Estate” was an enormous estate of land stretching from Easingwold to Stillington in the North and from Tollerton cross roads to Huby in the South. In the 1880s the whole Estate was bought by the Love family from County Durham where they had made their fortune in the coal mining industry. This allowed them to develop the Estate and become major benefactors to the market town of Easingwold where a number of buildings have foundation stones bearing the name of Katherine Love. Intriguingly the Easingwold Cricket Club pitch was sited in adjacent to the main buildings of the Hawkhills Estate with spectators and players thinking nothing of walk or riding the two miles to take part or watch!

Records going back to the 1830s show a farmhouse and buildings at “Low Hawk Hills”. That farmhouse forms what is now known as the “Old Farmhouse” on the Park and was built with 2” bricks and comprised a one storey building. The building to the immediate west was built at a later stage but was used as a Smithy for the Farm and the larger Hawkhills Estate. The Smithy had in it a working large set of bellows which were in place until the 1990s when the building was substantially damaged by a heavy snow storm.